The first church on the site, replacing a Roman bath, dates to the early 4th century, though the crypt section places it in the 5th. About a century later Prefect Leontios replaced the small oratory with a three-aisled basilica. After repeated fires it was rebuilt from 629 to 634 as a five-aisled basilica, which the article says survives much as it is today. It names no architect and gives no dimensions.
Six mosaic panels show Saint Demetrius with founders and children, made between that rebuild and the start of Iconoclasm. The Ottomans turned the church into the Kasımiye Camii around 1493, and it remained a mosque until 1912.
The Great Thessaloniki Fire of 1917 destroyed the roof, upper walls and most mosaics. The church was reconsecrated in 1949, and UNESCO listed it in 1988. A crypt museum occupies the former bathhouse.
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